For example: wet muck of the stream’s muddy bank. Muck is always wet and if the muck is on the bank, then "muddy" is redundant. The soil was also described as "mushy."
Other candidates: sudden disturbance. The snake strike established that it was sudden. flung his tall, lean frame -> flung himself. Golden-green fronds: they're usually green.
One other nit: the serpent head per se doesn't stop its lunge, so the first sentence seems odd. The lunge ends or the snake stops its lunge.
Good luck.
"Del's Blue-Lipped Dragon leather boot" actually sounded, to me, like one of two things: either it was a brand name for his designer boots, or his boots have lips. I had to stop and parse the sentence to get those ideas out of my head.
If he flung himself backwards, surely he was trying to get away from the snake? And yet, if he was kneeling, his boots were behind him, so he must have been throwing himself AT the snake. Something doesn't fit here. Maybe he's alien, and his knees bend backwards? That would be quite interesting, if true (which seems unlikely), but you'd want to make it clear.
I think Rake's comment on POV and WouldBe's on "flung his tall, lean, frame" fit together. He would NOT think of throwing himself backward in those terms, so IF WE'RE IN HIS POV you simply can't use that phraseology. If you really want to use either cinematic or omniscient POV, you're free to do so, of course; but make sure you KNOW that you're doing it and have good reasons for it (of which there are few).
Oh, and I'd drop "Snake strike!" It's a bit melodramatic, and doesn't tell us anything that we don't learn in the next sentence anyway.
(parakeet is a term for any one of a large number of unrelated small to medium sized parrot species)wiki-- no large parakeets of any colour
A (wee bit)leaner take
Snake strike! The mottled head of the brown serpent , wicked fangs extending from its milky mouth, stopped just short of Del’s Dragon leather boot.
As the viper recoiled to thrust again, Del flung himself backward out from among the plant fronds where he had knelt. The soil bordering the tropical waterway softened his landing but not enough to prevent an “umph!” when he landed on his backside in the muck of the stream’s bank. The noise caused several yellow and green parakeets to bob and crane their heads to see the disturbance.
quote:
It reads a bit heavy with nearly every noun having a one or two of adjectives.
I agree.
Also, I'm not sure how I feel about the first setence. "Snake strike." It just seems off. Like a comic book or something.
Overall, though, you present a pretty interesting beginning. It has a hook, at least until Del wards off the snake, then something more should come quickly.
Del crab-legged backwards, his feet slipping on the wet ground, as the aggressive snake slithered toward him. It was almost miraculous that the serpent missed on the first attack, but Del knew that he might not be so lucky a second time. He struggled to regain his footing in the slippery ooze and instinctively raised a boot toward the viper. The tough dragon skin might provide some protection.
The snake curved its body into an "S" shape, exploded outward and sank its needle-sharp fangs into Del's right boot. Reflexively, Del kicked at the shiny v-shaped head, only to gape wide-eyed as he watched the meter-long snake struggle to free its fangs that were caught in the tough leather.
[This message has been edited by palmon (edited February 17, 2008).]
[This message has been edited by palmon (edited February 17, 2008).]
I have no major nits with the first paragraph, and only a few in the second.
quote:
The snake curved its body into an "S" shape, exploded outward and sank its needle-sharp fangs into Del's right boot. Reflexively, Del kicked at the shiny v-shaped head, only to gap(1) wide-eyed as he watched the meter-long snake struggle to free its fangs that were caught in the tough leather!(2)
1. Gap = gape. Could be a typo in the context of this post, but just wanted to double-check. Another thing...I see the phrase 'so and so gaped, wide-eyed as he/she watched...' kicking around a lot. It strikes me as kind of wordy for what it conveys and a little over-used.
2. Exclamation marks =
[This message has been edited by Marzo (edited February 17, 2008).]
Aside from that general rule (and general rules can be broken at times, as they say), in this particular case, I think that it simply doesn't add anything, but rather detracts. The sentence it caps is a little too long to end with a punch, and I find the snake's fangs being stuck in the leather enough of a surprise that the exclamation mark seems a restatement of the obvious.
I think it's primarily the length of the sentence, though. If you broke it in two into something like this, however: Reflexively, Del kicked at the shiny v-shaped head. He gaped, wide-eyed, as the meter-long snake struggled to free its fangs - they were caught in the leather!
It's more like we're inside Del's head, being surprised to discover that the snake is caught, and less like the narrator is telling us to be surprised when the situation makes that obvious.
I hope I've made sense. :/
Of course, all rules are meant to be broken. The exclamation mark has come, quite usefully, to indicate that the speaker is shouting (though even there you want to keep the use to a bare minimum). But you NEVER want the narrator to be shouting. Hence you NEVER use it in narration.
Let the reader decide how to react based on what is actually happening in the story.